Method of making a cigarette of reduced biological damage capability

ABSTRACT

This invention relates to a method for making a cigarette which has the same smoking properties as an ordinary cigarette but reduces components contained in the smoke of such a cigarette which cause cancer on the skin of mice. The method includes adding to the cigarette paper calcium sulfamate in an amount of from 0.1% to 1.0%, by weight, based on the combined weight of the tobacco and cigarette paper. Ammonia is added to the tobacco in an amount of from 0.015% to 0.15%, by weight, based on the combined weight of the cigarette paper and tobacco and the tobacco containing ammonia is wrapped with the cigarette paper containing the sulfamate salt. The preferred amount of calcium sulfamate in the paper, by weight, is from 0.2% to 0.8% and the preferred amount of ammonia in the tobacco is from 0.03% to 0.12%, by weight.

Elite States Patent [191 Michelson [4 1 Jan.1,1974

[ METHOD OF MAKING A CIGARETTE OF REDUCED BIOLOGICAL DAMAGE CAPABILITY[75] Inventor: Irving Michelson, New Rochelle,

[73] Assignee: American Safety Equipment Corporation, New York, N.Y.

[22] Filed: Aug. 2, 1972 [21] Appl. No.: 277,335

Primary Examiner-Melvin D. Rein Att0rneyC. A. Miketta et a1.

[57] ABSTRACT This invention relates to a method for making a cigarettewhich has the same smoking properties as an ordinary cigarette butreduces components contained in the smoke of such a cigarette whichcause cancer on the skin of mice. The method includes adding to thecigarette paper calcium-sulfamate in an amount of from 0.1% to 1.0%, byweight, based on the combined weight of the tobacco and cigarette paper.Ammonia is added to the tobacco in an amount of from 0.015% to 0.15%, byweight, based on the combined weight of the cigarette paper and tobaccoand the tobacco containing ammonia is wrapped with the cigarette papercontaining the sulfamate salt. The preferred amount of calcium sulfamatein the paper, by weight, is from 0.2% to 0.8% and the preferred amountof ammonia in the tobacco is from 0.03% to 0.12%, by weight.

7 Claims, No Drawings METHOD OF MAKING A CIGARETTE OF REDUCED BIOLOGICALDAMAGE CAPABILITY BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION In recent years, theconcern for the health of tobacco smokers, particularly cigarettesmokers, has increased. The reason for this concern is because of theevidence gathered by scientists around the world that smoking definitelyendangers the health of the smoker to a greater or lesser extent,depending upon the amount of the smoke, the extent to which it isinhaled, and the persons susceptibility to being injured by tobaccosmoke. For example, it is definitely established that cigarette smokersare more apt to develop lung cancer, bronchitis, emphysema, and sufferother biological damage than non-smokers. Figures from Smoking andHealth, report of the Advisory Committee to the Surgeon General,indicate that heavy smokers are to 25 times more susceptible to the riskof lung cancer than that of non-smokers and that light smokers changesof developing lung cancer is five to 10 times that of nonsmokers. Inaddition, the mortality of smokers because of bronchitis and emphysemais five to eight times that of non-smokers.

Because of the foregoing and other evidence that smoking is detrimentalto the health and well-being of people of all ages, the Federalgovernment of the United States has required all cigarette manufacturersto place on cigarette packages the warning that The Surgeon General HasDetermined That Cigarette Smoking Is Dangerous To Your Health. In spiteof this warning, the consumption of cigarettes and other tobacco hasactually decreased very little from the prior years. It is thus veryapparent that people who are addicted to cigarette smoking are veryunlikely to quit merely because they run the risk of having their healthseriously impaired.

It is thus a desideratum in the art to produce a tobacco composition,the smokeof which has a reduced amount of components which are apt tocause biological damage to the smoker. It is therefore not surprisingthat in the past decade the prior art has endeavored to produce a safetobacco, particularly safe cigarettes. For the most part, the prior artattempts have centered around the idea of filtering out or screening thetars produced during the smoking of the tobacco. However, this has notbeen entirely satisfactory because inter alia it appears that thematerials produced in the smoking of the cigarette which causebiological damage can not be filtered out selectively and therefore thefiltered smoke still contains substantially the same proportions ofdeleterious material as the unfiltered smoke.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention provides cigarettemeeting the above desideratum in that the cigarettes produced by themethod of the present invention produce a smoke which contains fewercomponents which cause cancer on the skin of mice than a correspondinguntreated cigarette. This surprising result is obtained by the presentinvention by adding a critical amount of calcium sulfamate to cigarettepaper and adding a critical amount of ammonia to the tobacco.

Thus, it can be seen, that the principal object of the present inventionis to disclose and provide a method for making a cigarette composed ofcured tobacco wrapped in paper, the smoke of said cigarette having asignificantly reduced amount of components which cause tumors on theskin of mice.

Another object of the present invention is to disclose and provide amethod for treating cigarette paper with DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERREDEMBODIMENTS The foregoing objects, and others, are accomplished by thepresent invention by the addition of from 0.1% to 1.0% of calciumsulfamate, calculated as Ca(- SO NHQ to the cigarette paper and theaddition of ammonia to the tobacco in an amount of from 0.015% to 0.15%,by weight. The preferred range of calcium sulfamate added to the paperis from 0.2% to 0.8% and thepreferred range of ammonia added to thetobacco is from 0.03% to 0.12%, all percentages being by weight, basedon the combined weight of the tobacco and cigarette paper.

The ammonia can be added to the tobacco in any convenient manner;however, it is preferred to add the ammonia to the tobacco (preferablycut or shredded tobacco) by spraying a solution of ammonium hydroxide onthe tobacco while the tobacco is being rolled and tumbled in order toinsure that the ammonia is distributed substantially uniformlythroughout the tobacco. Thereafter, if necessary, the tobacco can bedried to remove the solvent (e.g. water) for the ammonia. However,inasmuch as tobacco utilized for cigarettes contains a certain amount ofmoisture it may not be necessary to dry the tobacco after the additionof ammonia thereto.

It is even more preferred if the ammonia is added during the time whenother additives such as humec tants, sweetners and flavoring agents arebeing added to the tobacco. These additives are added to the tobacco byso-called casing solutions. For example, in general, there are at leasttwo casing solutions which are added separately to the tobacco.Hurnectants such as glycerine are added to the tobacco by dissolving thehumectant in water andthen spraying the resulting solution on thetobacco. Sweeteners are also added in the same manner in that thesweetener is dissolved in an aqueous medium and the resulting solutionsprayed on the tobacco. These two types of additives are usually appliedas one solution. Inasmuch as ammonium hydroxide is water soluble it ispreferred if the ammonium hydroxide is added to the above-identifiedaqueous casing solution. However, it is also possible that ammonia canbe added when the flavoring agents are added to the tobacco. Generallyspeaking, the flavoring agents such as peppermint oil are applied in analcohol medium.

The calcium sulfamate is conveniently added to the paper via an aqueoussolution inasmuch as calcium sulfamate is soluble in water. Thus, itbecomes convenient, to add the calcium sulfamate in an aqueous solutionwhich will contain other normal cigaratte paper additives by passing aroll of commercial cigarette paper through the aqueous solution ofcalcium sulfamate and squeezing the excess solution out by pressurerollers. Normally, utilizing this method, 70 percent of the calciumsulfamate solution will be retained on the paper. Therefore in order toprepare a cigarette paper containing 0.2 percent, by weight, of calciumsulfamate (calculated on the weight of the paper and tobacco) thecigarette paper is passed through an aqueous solution containing 6.34pounds of calcium sulfamate made up to l2 gallons by the addition ofwater. In order to prepare a cigarette containing 0.8 percent calciumsulfamate it is merely necessary to pass the cigarette paper through anaqueous solution containing 25.35 pounds made up to 12 gallons by theaddition of water.

In order to demonstrate the effectiveness of the present inventiontwodifferent groups of cigarettes were made containing varying amounts ofcalcium sulfamate and ammonia. The first group contained 0.06 percentammonia in the tobacco and 0.38 percent calcium sulfamate on the paper.The second group contained about 0.09 percent of ammonia in the tobaccoand 0.58 percent of calcium sulfamate on the paper. Another group ofcigarettes was designated as the control group and contained the samestandard blend of cigarette tobacco and the same batch of cigarettepaper as was utilized on the test cigarettes. The untreated cigarettesprovide a control against which to compare the treated cigarettes, inorder to evaluate the effectiveness of the treatment.

The cigarettes from all three groups are smoked in a manifold-typesmoking machine, one 2-second puff per minute, with the suction pressureequal to that which delivered 17.5 ml./sec. of smoke in samplecigarettes of the respective groups. The smoke is condensed in two litercollection flasks immersed in dry ice-methanol mixture. The condensateis removed from the flasks with acetone. The acetone suspension isconcentrated in a flash evaporator until all of the acetone is drivenoff. The remaining crude tar is treated with an equal volume of acetoneand then eight volumes of heptane are added slowly with vigorous shakingto provide a two-phase system. The upper phase is concentrated in aflash evaporator until all of the heptane is apparently driven off. Ithas been shown that this fraction of the tar contains all of thecarcinogenic activity that is found in crude cigarette tar.

The various tars collected as exemplified above were diluted such thatequivalent weights of crude tar were present in the appropriate testsolution for each group of cigarettes used. Female lCR Swiss mice at6070 days of age were used in the test for tumor activity. The mice weredivided into two groups, 100 in each group. The mice in each group wereshaved and then painted two times daily, 5 days a week, for 44 weekswith the solution of tar obtained as indicate supra. About once a monththe tar was replaced by a fresh batch which was obtained in exactly thesame manner as the original tar. After a period of 44 weeks it wasdetermined tha the smoke of the Group I treated cigarettes produced 50percent fewer tumors on the skin of mice than the control group had andthe Group II cigarettes produced 40 percent fewer tumors than thecontrol group. At the end of the sixtieth week the Group I cigarettesproduced 30 percent fewer tumors than the smoke of the untreatedcigarettes and the Group ll cigarettes produced 27 percent fewer tumorsthan the smoke of the untreated cigarettes.

in the foregoing embodiment the ammonia was applied to the tobacco byspraying a 58 percent ammo nium hydroxide solution onto the tobacco;however, the ammonium can be added to the tobacco in any convenientmanner and the invention is not limited to spraying an aqueous solutionof ammonium hydroxide thereon. Similarly, the calcium sulfamate can beadded to the cigarette paper in any convenient manner and notnecessarily by an aqueous solution thereof.

I claim:

1. A method for producing a cigarette which, when smoldered produces asmoke which has a lesser amount of components which cause tumors on theskin of mice which comprises uniformly distributing throughout the paperfrom about 0.1% to 1.0%, by weight, of calcium sulfamate and uniformlydistributing throughout the tobacco of the cigarette from about 0.015%to 0.15%, by weight, of ammonia and wrapping the thus obtained paperaround the tobacco to produce a cigarette.

2. A method according to claim 1 wherein the amount of calcium sulfamatein the paper, by weight, is from 0.2% to 0.8% and the amount of ammoniain tobacco is from 0.03% to 0.12%, by weight.

3. A method according to claim 1 wherein the ammonia is uniformlydistributed throughout the tobacco by contacting said tobacco with asolution of ammonium hydroxide.

4. A method according to claim 3 where the solution containing ammoniumhydroxide is an aqueous solution.

5. A method according to claim 3 wherein the ammonium hydroxide is in analcoholic medium.

6. A method according to claim 1 wherein the calcium sulfamate is addedto the paper by contacting said paper with a solution containing calciumsulfamate.

7. A method according to claim 6 wherein the solution containing calciumsulfamate is an aqueous solution.

2. A method according to claim 1 wherein the amount of calcium sulfamatein the paper, by weight, is from 0.2% to 0.8% and the amount of ammoniain tobacco is from 0.03% to 0.12%, by weight.
 3. A method according toclaim 1 wherein the ammonia is uniformly distributed throughout thetobacco by contacting said tobacco with a solution of ammoniumhydroxide.
 4. A method according to claim 3 where the solutioncontaining ammonium hydroxide is an aqueous solution.
 5. A methodaccording to claim 3 wherein the ammonium hydroxide is in an alcoholicmedium.
 6. A method according to claim 1 wherein the calcium sulfamateis added to the paper by contacting said paper with a solutioncontaining calcium sulfamate.
 7. A method according to claim 6 whereinthe solution containing calcium sulfamate is an aqueous solution.